Kinzinger says raising the age to purchase guns to 21 a ‘no-brainer’

Rep. Adam Kinzinger (R-Ill.) said on Sunday that raising the legal age for firearms purchases to 21 “is a no brainer” in the wake of the recent string of mass shootings in the U.S. 

During an appearance on ABC’s “This Week,” Kinzinger told moderator Jonathan Karl that raising the age to purchase firearms would be a good start, noting the alleged shooters in the massacres in Uvalde, Texas, Buffalo, New York and Parkland, Florida were all under the age of 21.

“I do think we’re on the track to maybe getting something,” Kinzinger said, adding that Sen. Chris Murphy (D-Conn.), a long-time gun reform advocate, “is right” not to focus on it now.”

“But I think that raising the age of gun purchase to 21 is a no-brainer,” Kinzinger added.

“If you look at the Parkland shooting, you look at Buffalo, you look at this shooting, these are people under the age of 21. We know that the human brain develops and matures a lot between the age of 18 and 21. We just raised without really so much as a blink the age of purchasing cigarettes federally to 21. I think we need to get there eventually,” Kinzinger added. 

When asked about his change of views on firearms, Kinzinger replied that he is “getting sick of seeing the mass shootings.”

“I’m a strong defender of the Second Amendment,” Kinzinger told Karl. “And one of the things I believe that for some reason is a very rare thing is that as a person that appreciates and believes in the Second Amendment, we have to be the ones putting forward reasonable solutions to gun violence.”

Kinzinger’s remarks come after come after 19 schoolchildren and two teachers were killed and 17 other people were injured last Tuesday in Uvalde when a gunman opened fire inside of a fourth-grade classroom at Robb Elementary School. 

The massacre in Texas happened a week after the mass shooting at a supermarket in Buffalo, N.Y., which resulted in the deaths of ten people. 

A bipartisan group of senators is discussing gun reform legislation in response to the recent string of mass shootings.